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This is Plato's conception: to him participation does not, in
the case of Matter, comport any such presence of an Ideal-form in
a Substance to be shaped by it as would produce one compound
thing made up of the two elements changing at the same moment,
merging into one another, modified each by the other.
In his haste to his purpose he raises many difficult questions,
but he is determined to disown that view; he labours to indicate
in what mode Matter can receive the Ideal-forms without being,
itself, modified. The direct way is debarred since it is not easy
to point to things actually present in a base and yet leaving
that base unaffected: he therefore devises a metaphor for
participation without modification, one which supports, also, his
thesis that all appearing to the senses is void of substantial
existence and that the region of mere seeming is vast.
Holding, as he does, that it is the patterns displayed upon
Matter that cause all experience in living bodies while the
Matter itself remains unaffected, he chooses this way of stating
its immutability, leaving us to make out for ourselves that those
very patterns impressed upon it do not comport any experience,
any modification, in itself.
In the case, no doubt, of the living bodies that take one pattern
or shape after having borne another, it might be said that there
was a change, the variation of shape being made verbally
equivalent to a real change: but since Matter is essentially
without shape or magnitude, the appearing of shape upon it can by
no freedom of phrase be described as a change within it. On this
point one must have "a rule for thick and thin" one may safely
say that the underlying Kind contains nothing whatever in the
mode commonly supposed.
But if we reject even the idea of its really containing at least
the patterns upon it, how is it, in any sense, a recipient?
The answer is that in the metaphor cited we have some reasonably
adequate indication of the impassibility of Matter coupled with
the presence upon it of what may be described as images of things
not present.
But we cannot leave the point of its impassibility without a
warning against allowing ourselves to be deluded by sheer custom
of speech.
Plato speaks of Matter as becoming dry, wet, inflamed, but we
must remember the words that follow: "and taking the shape of air
and of water": this blunts the expressions "becoming wet,
becoming inflamed"; once we have Matter thus admitting these
shapes, we learn that it has not itself become a shaped thing but
that the shapes remain distinct as they entered. We see, further,
that the expression "becoming inflamed" is not to be taken
strictly: it is rather a case of becoming fire. Becoming fire is
very different from becoming inflamed, which implies an outside
agency and, therefore, susceptibility to modification. Matter,
being itself a portion of fire, cannot be said to catch fire. To
suggest that the fire not merely permeates the matter, but
actually sets it on fire is like saying that a statue permeates
its bronze.
Further, if what enters must be an Ideal-Principle how could it
set Matter aflame? But what if it is a pattern or condition? No:
the object set aflame is so in virtue of the combination of
Matter and condition.
But how can this follow on the conjunction when no unity has been
produced by the two?
Even if such a unity had been produced, it would be a unity of
things not mutually sharing experiences but acting upon each
other. And the question would then arise whether each was
effective upon the other or whether the sole action was not that
of one (the form) preventing the other [the Matter] from slipping
away?
But when any material thing is severed, must not the Matter be
divided with it? Surely the bodily modification and other
experience that have accompanied the sundering, must have
occurred, identically, within the Matter?
This reasoning would force the destructibility of Matter upon us:
"the body is dissolved; then the Matter is dissolved." We would
have to allow Matter to be a thing of quantity, a magnitude. But
since it is not a magnitude it could not have the experiences
that belong to magnitude and, on the larger scale, since it is
not body it cannot know the experiences of body.
In fact those that declare Matter subject to modification may as
well declare it body right out.
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